Chief Justice Abdul Ghanee Mohamed stated last night that a special task force will be created to complete the backlog that has been accumulated by the courts.
While speaking at the opening ceremony of the Judicial Year 2026, the Chief Justice said that all matters can only move forward in a stable manner by establishing a mechanism that can monitor operations. And if such a mechanism has not been established, it is not possible to drive good results, said the Chief Justice.
The Chief Justice stated everyone believes that 'justice delayed is justice denied', and that the courts have cases that have been unsolved for long periods of time.
And so, the most important goal to be achieved by the judiciary is to begin working on said cases and expedite their completion, said the Chief Justice.
The courts in Maldives have a backlog of 13,032 cases that have been unsolved for more than a year. One of the things to prioritize is to bring about quick justice to these 13,032 cases, as per the Chief Justice.
"...In order to achieve this, we have decided to make arrangements to hastily provide justice with hard work and without stoppage to the estimated 21,000 plus cases that will be newly registered to the court in 2026," said the Chief Justice.
According to the Chief Justice, a special task force will be formed tomorrow to coordinate the delay in justice from the backlog of court cases. The task force will ask the assigned Magistrate Judge as to the reason why the case has been unsolved and facilitate its completion.
The Chief Justice continued, stating that if the case saw a delay in completion due to a lack of assistance from any state administration, a solution is to be found by holding discussions with said administration.
The Chief Justice stated that with this work moving forward, those who are being held in remand will see their cases come to a close in a quick fashion, which is a point of concern for society.
"Our aim is to make the judiciary stable and responsible by ridding it of the backlog of unfinished cases by the time 2026 comes to an end," said the Chief Justice.
